God ignited a spark on Sunday

Sundays for me mean leading worship. I recall reading in "Worship Matters" by Bob Kauflin that someone once commented that leading worship week in week out seems boring. And Bob responded that, without God, it would be! That's me at the moment. On a human level, what we're doing doesn't seem to make much sense - gathering, singing, reading a book, praying, sitting, listening.
But when you look deeper, see what's really going on - it's profound. It's about pathetic human beings reaching out to touch the Divine and being touched in return.

Take for example Sunday - we'd sung some songs, prayed for the VBS this week, listened to the message about Christ's forgiveness and reinstatement of Peter in John 21 and then the music band got back up to sing a couple more songs - "From the Inside Out" and "Mighty to Save". During "Inside Out", I noticed some movement going on to my left - Marcia, one of the worship team had stopped singing, overcome with the reality of what she was singing:

"And the cry of my heart is to bring you praise
From the inside out, Lord my soul cries out"

I didn't look over and see, but I remember seeing from the corner of my eye that something was going on. Marcia had put down her mic. We sang the song "Inside out" with passion and a painful desire for God. It was then that the Holy Spirit gave me a prayer to pray. A pray I would not have prayed on my own; a stutter-free prayer of power and truth. It was a prayer focused on the finished work of the cross, and what this means to our day to day lives. When Christ said "It is finished", He meant "It is finished". I prayed the prayer, but the Holy Spirit prayed the prayer to me. I was the utterer of the prayer. I was the recipient of the prayer. God was speaking through me to me (OK, He was speaking to other people too!). Even during the sermon, God had placed a deep desire in my heart for people to get, really get that all that is good about God and all that is broken about us meets at the cross. The cross is the centre, the flashpoint, what it's all about. And then God gave me that prayer.

It's funny how leading public worship can sometimes be an intensely private affair as if it is just "me and God", so sweet and so intense is the experience. There's no need to rush - we just want to linger. I know that public worship is public worship and the entire local church body joins in. Yet so real is the encounter, during times like this past Sunday, that the refrain "Mine, mine, mine, I know Thou art mine. Saviour, dear Saviour, I know Thou are mine" does not seem remiss. It captures the moment. It is US and God. It's also me and God.

It was as if God-touching-Marcia was the spark and then the fire spread in a wave. This isn't about lifting any individual up, but it is about noticing the mystery and wonder of how God moves.

Then, as the cherry on top of the dessert, we were able to finish off with "Mighty to Save" - what powerful lyrics; what a powerful song.

My last observation, and this highlights the grace of God is this: I had had an earthy week - not much time spent in the heavenlies - faced with my weakness and sin, I came in on Sunday more aware of this clay than all your power within, as Paul Oakley puts it in his song "I need you now".

It made me realize that God desires to bless us. Yes, He wants a holy people (yet how much of my holiness is true holiness and how much is legalism...just trying to win God's favour?) Yet God, in His sovereign grace chose to minister to me and through me as He prayed through me and to me.

And I thank Him for that.

But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. (2 Corinthians 4:7)